04 January 2013

Today is January 4, 2013. On January 9, 2009, I posted Saving New Toulouse here in my blog. It has been four years, almost to the day. I can not believe how quickly the time flew.

To everything there is a season and my season with New Toulouse comes to a close. I have so many things that I wish to express to all of you, but the one thing that keeps sounding in my heart is "thank you".

Thank you for choosing to make New Toulouse a part of your lives. Thank you for the support that you gave me and the estate during my tenure as the estate owner. My name might have been on the monthly bill to Linden Lab, but it was each and every one of you that brought New Toulouse to life.

Thank you to the "New Toulouse Angels". These were the people who loaned, or flat out gave, me money in order to purchase New Toulouse from Mama Cree in January 2009. If it had not been for them, New Toulouse would have been wiped off the Second Life grid four years ago.

Thank you to everyone who served as a New Toulouse estate manager over the last four years. I would like to give honorable mentions to rmarie Beedit and Loken Jewell, both of whom went above and beyond to assist me and the residents of New Toulouse on a regular basis.

Thank you to Mr. Eclectric Breitman, my partner in vision. Your talent, gifts and true love of New Orleans brought sustaining life to New Toulouse over the last two and a half years. Thank you for showing me once again how amazing it is to work collaboratively with talented and committed people in Second Life.

Thank you to the wonderful New Toulouse Corsaires and Commodore Loken. We had so much fun together! I will never forget showing up to the Fleet Week 2011 competition in bikinis while all of the other groups wore proper uniforms. We certainly took them all by surprise. :-D

Thank you to the many of you who held events, be they regular or one-time only. So many wonderful times come to mind: Monday's with Carter at Madhu's, the long-running Jazz by the Canal, Mardi Gras, the hurricanes, art gallery events, gatherings at Frannie's and Holo's, the Egg Scramble, the Art Walk on Shotgun Row and many more.

Thank you to those of you who sent me messages of thanks, understanding and encouragement during the last two weeks. Your grace during such a difficult time for all of us gave me strength. I can not even begin to express how much your words meant to me.

I am still here for you. If you ever need anything, just drop me a notecard or email me. You are always welcome in the Riel Estates, which are comprised of Witchport, Witchwoods and Carntaigh.

I brought years of experience in Second Life community-building with me when I arrived in New Toulouse. I learned even more over the last four years. It takes time, commitment, determination, selflessness, contributions from everyone and a decent helping of magic to bring any community to life, let alone one in a virtual world.

It's these things that will enable New Toulouse to stay vibrant and moving forward. New Toulouse does not exist based on the actions of two or three people. No one can create a community spirit alone. New Toulouse is not Mama Cree. New Toulouse is not Gabrielle Riel.

New Toulouse is you. It's all of you that are the Spirit of New Toulouse.

Je vous souhaite beaucoup de bonheur,
Gabrielle

1 comments:

Maxwell37 Carter
said...

Thank you for all, i stay on NT bayou because it is a wonderfull sim, nice job.have a nice day